Black Death
18. In what ways did the Black Death change European society? Was its impact entirely negative?
In 1346 an extremely infectious plague,[1] travelling west along the silk route, reached the Genoese colony at the port of Caffa on the Black Sea; from there the plague would spread throughout Europe and thus began what chronicler Henry Knighton described as “a universal mortality of men throughout the world.”[2] As the plague spread it decimated the population; the effects of such a sudden change in demographics were varied and compounded by sporadic outbreaks of the plague that continued until the seventeenth century. The advent of the plague resulted in changes to land-holding, living conditions, intra-societal relationships, medicine, the Church and more. This essay aims to examine a number of these effects and to consider whether this plague, now known as the Black Death,[3] should be considered merely a catastrophe or whether it provided a positive catalyst for lasting change.
Upon reaching Europe the plague moved from port towns, such as Pisa, Venice, Marseilles and Barcelona, into the hinterlands and then moved northwards. Between December 1347 and December 1349 the disease had affected almost all of Europe. The symptoms of the disease were varied; they included a combination of large glandular swellings [buboes] in the groin, armpit or neck, pustules, spitting blood, fevers, headaches and sharp pains.[4] Chroniclers were shocked by the speed in which the plague spread and killed.[5] The majority of victims died within three to five days of exhibiting symptoms but others could appear healthy and be dead the next morning.[6] Chroniclers were also astonished at the universality of the plague; it seemed to be engulfing the entire world, it affected both man and mammals, and it killed indiscriminately, ignoring both wealth and status.[7]
The immediate effect of the first outbreak of the Black Death wherever it struck was to create a temporary breakdown in the normal societal order. Chroniclers, such as Boccacio, described immoral behaviour in the face of what seemed certain death; this included women being cared for by male strangers, drunken gluttony and lechery, and looting.[8] The breakdown of familial ties, as the potentially healthy abandoned the sick, concerned many.[9] Although ruling elites attempted to continue asserting their power, respect for them was undercut by the fact that many fled to isolated locations and that their decrees sometimes seemed a breach of natural order.[10] Boccacio was not alone in his shocked grief that the ordinances of many Italian city-states no longer allowed traditional funeral customs and instead bodies were gathered onto carts and taken to mass graves outside the cities.[11] There was also surprise at the letter of Bishop Ralph of Shrewsbury who informed his clergy that, due to the plague, it was now necessary for parishioners to confess their sins to their neighbours and that faith could replace the extreme unction if no priest remained alive to perform these duties for them.[12]
However, this immediate disruption to society did not continue indefinitely. As the plague passed, communities attempted to re-create the life they had before the Black Death;[13] this was not entirely possible. The percentage of deaths caused by the plague would have varied in each community; some may have had death rates as low as 20%,[14] some as high as 80%,[15] and Johannes Nohl estimates 200,000 market towns and villages in Europe were completely depopulated.[16] The general agreement among historians places the conservative estimate of deaths, averaged across Europe, as being approximately 30%, although Rosemary Horrox argues in favour of this being raised to 40-55%.[17] The Black Death had significantly altered population levels in Europe and recurrent outbreaks of the plague, including 1361-2, 1369 and 1375, kept the population artificially low into the fifteenth century.[18]
One of the key changes that occurred as a result of this newly altered demographic was that land-use altered in several ways as a result of vacated holdings and a decreased supply of labourers. Throughout Europe many landlords reacted to this situation by altering property boundaries; this allowed more coherent parcels of land to be created while adjusting section sizes to allow for fewer tenants, for example breaking up demesne land into more modest-sized units suitable for farming or amalgamating small parcels of land.[19] These newly created parcels of land became sites of negotiation between landowners and tenants. In France, the Italian states and Mediterranean countries sharecropping rapidly increased while in England there began to be move away from direct farming using serfs to leasing out land for monetary rents.[20] Several historians have argued that these land-use changes had further long-term effects. C. Hollister argues that these changes resulted in the disintegration of the manorial system, with its demise evident by the sixteenth century;[21] Philip Ziegler cautions that the Black Death acted as an accelerant factor in this process but was not the sole causal agent.[22] David Nicholas argues that continued recurrences of the Black Death contributed towards uncertain grain prices and high wages of labourers resulting in a diversification of farming throughout Europe, by 1450, that included cultivating vegetables, stock rearing and an increase in wool farming.[23]
Immediately following the Black Death the wages of workers did rise dramatically; chroniclers such as Jean de Venette expressed their astonishment at the wages of hired labourers, farm workers and servants doubling.[24] There were attempts by the nobility to mitigate these pay increases. In England the Ordinance and Statute of Labourers were passed in 1349 and 1351 respectively; similar laws were passed elsewhere in Europe.[25] These laws were designed to prevent free-market wage setting; they stipulated that wages were to be reduced to pre-plague levels and that a peasant was required to accept their first offer of work.[26] There is disagreement over how strictly labour laws were adhered to, however, the situation altered with the outbreak of plague in 1361-2; it, and subsequent outbreaks, kept labour in high demand.[27] As a result the wages of workers throughout Europe remained higher than pre-plague wages for the rest of the fourteenth century.[28] In turn, this resulted in a higher standard of living; records indicate that their diet improved, as did the quality of their possessions, for example the replacement of earthenware cooking vessels by metallic ones.[29]
However, the increase in wages and improvement in living conditions for workers, as well as attempts by the nobility to mitigate these, provided a new cause for tension between workers and the nobility. Horrox suggests that the relationship between landlords and tenants became increasingly confrontational in the second half of the fourteenth century.[30] In addition, she argues that many contemporary writers began to complain about the decline of visible marks of social distinction and to condemn workers for the ‘frivolous leisure pursuits’ that were indulged in as wages increased.[31] Hollister suggests that the growing sense of grievance at upwards mobility and at this mobility being resisted may have been the cause of popular uprisings, in the latter part of the fourteenth century, in France (1358), England (1381) and also in Spain, the Netherlands and the Holy Roman Empire.[32] Ziegler contends that many factors contributed towards these and that the Black Death cannot be attributed as a direct cause, however, he does suggest that the Black Death contributed towards a feeling of discontent and a desire for change.[33]
Ziegler suggests that the Black Death creating a growing social self-awareness was part of a wider changing attitude towards death.[34] A preoccupation with death wasn’t new to European society however the magnitude of the Black Death forcibly drew society’s attention to death as inexorable, as indifferent to status and as violently affecting the human body; this caused death to be re-evaluated. Death had been part of medieval artwork prior to the Black Death but afterwards there was an increasing emphasis on death as ‘the great equalizer’.[35] The plague had visibly demonstrated that death came for peasants, clergy and royalty alike. David Herlihy and Horrox also argue in favour of a distinct change, displayed in writings and artwork, following the Black Death. They suggest that death is no longer portrayed as being welcomed but as a commanding monster that ignores any desire to live and that increasingly life is portrayed as fragile and death as unpredictable.[36] The fragility of both the human body and the ability to show it reverence after death were emphasised by the numbers of rotting corpses and the necessity of mass graves and banned funeral rites during plague outbreaks.[37] This resulted in the formation of funeral fraternities and Horrox argues that it also contributed to the rise of transi tombs in the late fourteenth century.[38]
The Black Death not only changed attitudes towards death but also significantly altered attitudes towards the human body as it became increasingly important to understand it and the workings of disease. After 1348 there was a fundamental break in intellectual tradition as the authority of Aristotle declined and was replaced by Galen and as medicine turned from God to science for explanations.[39] The plague broke down the divisions between theorizing physicians and practicing surgeons.[40] Theoretical texts were replaced by writings focussed on practical advice and procedures based on actual experience.[41] The study of anatomy, previously banned by the Church, began to be urgently pursued.[42] Rather than attributing disease to God or astrology medical writers began to consider, as contributing factors, famine, overcrowding, lack of hygiene and unburied corpses and they supported the creation of health boards, quarantines and new sanitary regulations.[43]
Changes in medical attitudes reflected a wider disillusionment in the Church.[44] There appears to have been resentment that a catastrophe presented as divine punishment had not been preceded by warnings from the pulpit and in addition the Black Death was accompanied by both lay and ecclesiastical criticism of clergy abandoning their flock or reluctantly performing partial duties.[45] Disillusionment with the Church was heightened as the need to quickly replace so many dead clergy saw ordination requirements being ignored.[46] Knighton and Archbishop Islip were among chroniclers complaining about existing priests haggling for extra pay and new priests including the middle-aged and illiterate.[47] However, Sean Martin emphasises that disillusionment in the Church did not mean that society turned away from faith in God.[48] He argues that rather it created a greater willingness to listen to alternative preachers such as mendicants, Lollards and Wycliffites.[49] As the Black Death continued to recur, and clergy continued to die in large numbers, several additional changes occurred by the end of the fourteenth century. New career opportunities emerged as administrative posts previously restricted to clergy became open to laymen.[50] In addition, these educated laymen, and clergy, were now being taught in vernacular languages due to a lack of teachers left who were fluent in Latin or courtly French; for instance in England, Ireland and the Holy Roman Empire.[51]
The Black Death was a pandemic that caused a catastrophic number of deaths in Europe and took further lives in recurrent outbreaks. It was an event that left almost every remaining person bereaved. It is difficult to examine this period, with the limited records remaining, and have a fully accurate idea of the impact on society of the Black Death. It is likely that some changes it caused directly, such as in medical attitudes, that in other cases it accelerated processes that were already present, such as in land-use, and that we can only speculate about its importance as a factor in others, such as the decline of the manorial system and the peasant uprisings. In considering whether these changes were positive things the question of bias has to be considered. For the peasants that survived there were increased job opportunities, higher wages and an improved living standard by the end of the fourteenth century. However, secular and ecclesiastical landowners were likely to have a different opinion as higher wages, combined with falling prices of agricultural goods,[52] meant decreasing profits. The Church struggled with criticism and disillusionment as it attempted to justify the plague, the actions of its clergy during the plague and what was seen as falling recruitment standards directly after plague outbreaks. On the other hand, to our modern eyes, the Black Death was a positive factor in moving medieval European society closer towards our own; land-use began to move towards a monetary rent system, medicine moved away from faith towards science and anatomical studies, and a change to teaching in vernacular languages would ultimately help aid the development of nationalism. The number of fundamental changes to society that the Black Death caused made it more than a catastrophe; it was a catalyst that altered society from that which came before.
Works Cited
Bolton, Jim, ‘The world upside down. Plague as an agent of economic and social change’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996.
Byrne, Joseph P., The Black Death, Westport, 2004.
Cohn, Samuel K., The Black Death transformed: disease and culture in early Renaissance Europe, London, 2002.
Goldberg, Jeremy, ‘Introduction’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996.
Harper-Bill, Christopher, ‘The English Church and English religion after the Black Death’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996.
Hay, Denys, Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, 2nd ed., New York, 1995.
Herlihy, David, The Black Death and the transformation of the west, Samuel K. Cohn (ed.), Cambridge, Mass., 1997.
Hollister, C. Warren, Medieval Europe: a short history, 6th edn, New York, 1990.
Horrox, Rosemary, The Black Death, Manchester and New York, 1994.
Martin, Sean, The Black Death, Harpenden, 2001.
Nicholas, David, The Transformation of Europe, 1300-1600, London, 1999.
Nohl, Johannes, The Black Death: a chronicle of the plague compiled from contemporary sources, 2nd edn, London, 1961.
Platt, Colin, King Death: The Black Death and its aftermath in later-medieval England, London, 1996.
Ziegler, Philip, The Black Death, 2nd edn, London, 1998.
[1] The focus of this essay is on examining the effects of the plague rather than the disease itself. There is heated debate among historians and epidemiologists as to the nature of the plague, chiefly as to whether it is correct to link it to the bacillus that is responsible for the modern bubonic plague. An excellent treatise on the subject is: Samuel K. Cohn, The Black Death transformed: disease and culture in early Renaissance Europe, London, 2002.
[2] The plague was not restricted to Europe; it also spread throughout Asia, the Mediterranean, Russia, the Baltic and Africa. The scope of this essay however will be restricted to examining the plague’s effects in Europe.
David Herlihy, The Black Death and the transformation of the west, Samuel K. Cohn (ed.), Cambridge, Mass., 1997, pp. 23-25. Cohn, p. 102,
[3] At the time it was referred to as the ‘Big Death’ and this term continued to be used in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries to distinguish this plague from other diseases. Ibid. p. 104.
In the sixteenth century Danish and Swedish chroniclers renamed it the Black Death, meaning terrible/dreadful death, and this is the name that has continued in use to the present day. Herlihy, p. 17.
[4] Cohn, pp. 58-9, 61-2, 83.
[5] Ibid. p. 110; Philip Ziegler, The Black Death, 2nd edn, London, 1998, p. 23.
[6] Cohn, p. 84. Rosemary Horrox, The Black Death, Manchester and New York, 1994, p. 47.
[7] Cohn describes how contemporary chroniclers were shocked that the plague killed regardless of age, sex or social class, p. 100, 126. Horrox, p. 36, 54.
[8] Herlihy, p. 64. Sean Martin, The Black Death, Harpenden, 2001, p. 26, 28.
Johannes Nohl, The Black Death: a chronicle of the plague compiled from contemporary sources, 2nd edn, London, 1961, pp. 12-14.
[9] Nohl, p. 8. Martin, p. 27.
[10] Herlihy, p. 64. Nohl, p. 12.
[11] Herlihy, pp. 60-2. Horrox, pp. 196-8. Nohl, pp. 14-16.
[12] Herlihy, p. 42. Ziegler, p. 127.
[13] Horrox, p. 236.
[14] Ibid. p. 231.
[15] Herlihy, p. 17.
[16] Nohl, p. 7.
[17] These estimates are for the first outbreak of the Black Death, between 1347-1351. Cohn, p. 107. Horrox, p. 3, 231. Ziegler, p. 239.
[18] Significantly, although the first outbreak of the plague had no demographic restrictions, subsequent outbreaks largely targeted children suggesting that the disease had become endemic and that it was possible to build an immune reaction to it within the population. Cohn, p. 131, 212. Horrox, p. 11-12. Colin Platt, King Death: The Black Death and its aftermath in later-medieval England, London, 1996, p. 15.
[19] Joseph P. Byrne, The Black Death, Westport, 2004, p. 116. Denys Hay, Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, 2nd ed., New York, 1995, p. 35. Platt, p. 11.
[20] Jim Bolton, ‘The world upside down. Plague as an agent of economic and social change’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996, p. 18. Byrne, p. 57. Hay, p. 35. Ziegler, p. 247.
[21] C. Warren Hollister, Medieval Europe: a short history, 6th edn, New York, 1990, p. 331. Supported by Martin, p. 47.
[22] Ziegler, pp. 249-252.
[23] David Nicholas, The Transformation of Europe, 1300-1600, London, 1999, pp. 95-6.
[24] Horrox, p. 57.
[25] Legislation of labour occurred in England, Aragon, Castile, Ragusa, many Italian city-states and in parts of the Holy Roman Empire.
Ziegler, p. 246. Nicholas, p. 94. Cohn, p. 127.
[26] Byrne, p. 65.
[27] Christopher Harper-Bill, ‘The English Church and English religion after the Black Death’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996, p. 102.
Horrox, pp. 238-9.
[28] Horrox. p. 240.
[29] Jeremy Goldberg, ‘Introduction’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996, p. 8. Martin, p. 80.
[30] Horrox, pp. 239-40.
[31] Ibid. pp. 242-3. Herlihy, p. 48.
[32] Hollister, p. 332.
[33] Ziegler, pp. 258-9.
[34] Ibid. p. 136.
[35] For instance, as in Orcagna’s fresco “Triumph of Death” painted in the church of Santa Croce in Florence immediately after the Black Death. Ibid. p. 284. Horrox, pp. 244-5.
[36] Herlihy, p. 63.
[37] Nohl, p. 20. Cohn, p. 124. Horrox, pp. 244-5.
[38] Horrox, pp. 96, 244-5.
Transi tombs are multi-layered. On the top they show a glorified image of the person while on the bottom is displayed the reality of a worm-ridden corpse.
[39] Aristotle claimed that the heart was the key source of life whereas the Hippocratic-Galenic tradition emphasised the importance of three key sources: the brain, heart and liver. The Black Death, with its three key locations of glandular buboes: groin (linked to liver), armpit (linked to heart) and neck (linked to brain), appeared to prove Galen correct. Cohn, pp. 69-70 and 216.
[40] Herlihy, p. 72.
[41] Cohn, pp. 66-8.
[42] In 1300 Pope Boniface III published a Bull forbidding mutilation of corpses, making the study of anatomy through dissection difficult; Ziegler, p. 71. This altered with the coming of the Black Death as authorities began to actively encourage physicians to perform autopsies; Byrne, p. 114; Herlihy, p. 72.
[43] Cohn, pp. 230-1.
Further information on the formation of health boards and the introduction of sanitary regulations and quarantines can be accessed from the following sources: Byrne, pp. 110-1, 117; Herlihy, p. 63; Horrox, pp. 100, 195-205, Ziegler, pp. 53-4.
[44] Martin, p. 80.
[45] Ziegler, pp. 35-6, 269. Herlihy, p. 64.
[46] Ziegler, p. 270.
[47] Harper-Bill, pp. 90-1. Horrox, p. 241. Martin, p. 80. Ziegler, pp. 270-2.
[48] Martin, loc. cit.; supported by Harper-Bill, p. 89.
[49] Martin, loc. cit.
[50] Harper-Bill, p. 89.
[51] Byrne, p. 69. Martin, p. 80. Ziegler, p. 260.
[52] Bolton, p. 18. Harper-Bill, p. 100-1.
In 1346 an extremely infectious plague,[1] travelling west along the silk route, reached the Genoese colony at the port of Caffa on the Black Sea; from there the plague would spread throughout Europe and thus began what chronicler Henry Knighton described as “a universal mortality of men throughout the world.”[2] As the plague spread it decimated the population; the effects of such a sudden change in demographics were varied and compounded by sporadic outbreaks of the plague that continued until the seventeenth century. The advent of the plague resulted in changes to land-holding, living conditions, intra-societal relationships, medicine, the Church and more. This essay aims to examine a number of these effects and to consider whether this plague, now known as the Black Death,[3] should be considered merely a catastrophe or whether it provided a positive catalyst for lasting change.
Upon reaching Europe the plague moved from port towns, such as Pisa, Venice, Marseilles and Barcelona, into the hinterlands and then moved northwards. Between December 1347 and December 1349 the disease had affected almost all of Europe. The symptoms of the disease were varied; they included a combination of large glandular swellings [buboes] in the groin, armpit or neck, pustules, spitting blood, fevers, headaches and sharp pains.[4] Chroniclers were shocked by the speed in which the plague spread and killed.[5] The majority of victims died within three to five days of exhibiting symptoms but others could appear healthy and be dead the next morning.[6] Chroniclers were also astonished at the universality of the plague; it seemed to be engulfing the entire world, it affected both man and mammals, and it killed indiscriminately, ignoring both wealth and status.[7]
The immediate effect of the first outbreak of the Black Death wherever it struck was to create a temporary breakdown in the normal societal order. Chroniclers, such as Boccacio, described immoral behaviour in the face of what seemed certain death; this included women being cared for by male strangers, drunken gluttony and lechery, and looting.[8] The breakdown of familial ties, as the potentially healthy abandoned the sick, concerned many.[9] Although ruling elites attempted to continue asserting their power, respect for them was undercut by the fact that many fled to isolated locations and that their decrees sometimes seemed a breach of natural order.[10] Boccacio was not alone in his shocked grief that the ordinances of many Italian city-states no longer allowed traditional funeral customs and instead bodies were gathered onto carts and taken to mass graves outside the cities.[11] There was also surprise at the letter of Bishop Ralph of Shrewsbury who informed his clergy that, due to the plague, it was now necessary for parishioners to confess their sins to their neighbours and that faith could replace the extreme unction if no priest remained alive to perform these duties for them.[12]
However, this immediate disruption to society did not continue indefinitely. As the plague passed, communities attempted to re-create the life they had before the Black Death;[13] this was not entirely possible. The percentage of deaths caused by the plague would have varied in each community; some may have had death rates as low as 20%,[14] some as high as 80%,[15] and Johannes Nohl estimates 200,000 market towns and villages in Europe were completely depopulated.[16] The general agreement among historians places the conservative estimate of deaths, averaged across Europe, as being approximately 30%, although Rosemary Horrox argues in favour of this being raised to 40-55%.[17] The Black Death had significantly altered population levels in Europe and recurrent outbreaks of the plague, including 1361-2, 1369 and 1375, kept the population artificially low into the fifteenth century.[18]
One of the key changes that occurred as a result of this newly altered demographic was that land-use altered in several ways as a result of vacated holdings and a decreased supply of labourers. Throughout Europe many landlords reacted to this situation by altering property boundaries; this allowed more coherent parcels of land to be created while adjusting section sizes to allow for fewer tenants, for example breaking up demesne land into more modest-sized units suitable for farming or amalgamating small parcels of land.[19] These newly created parcels of land became sites of negotiation between landowners and tenants. In France, the Italian states and Mediterranean countries sharecropping rapidly increased while in England there began to be move away from direct farming using serfs to leasing out land for monetary rents.[20] Several historians have argued that these land-use changes had further long-term effects. C. Hollister argues that these changes resulted in the disintegration of the manorial system, with its demise evident by the sixteenth century;[21] Philip Ziegler cautions that the Black Death acted as an accelerant factor in this process but was not the sole causal agent.[22] David Nicholas argues that continued recurrences of the Black Death contributed towards uncertain grain prices and high wages of labourers resulting in a diversification of farming throughout Europe, by 1450, that included cultivating vegetables, stock rearing and an increase in wool farming.[23]
Immediately following the Black Death the wages of workers did rise dramatically; chroniclers such as Jean de Venette expressed their astonishment at the wages of hired labourers, farm workers and servants doubling.[24] There were attempts by the nobility to mitigate these pay increases. In England the Ordinance and Statute of Labourers were passed in 1349 and 1351 respectively; similar laws were passed elsewhere in Europe.[25] These laws were designed to prevent free-market wage setting; they stipulated that wages were to be reduced to pre-plague levels and that a peasant was required to accept their first offer of work.[26] There is disagreement over how strictly labour laws were adhered to, however, the situation altered with the outbreak of plague in 1361-2; it, and subsequent outbreaks, kept labour in high demand.[27] As a result the wages of workers throughout Europe remained higher than pre-plague wages for the rest of the fourteenth century.[28] In turn, this resulted in a higher standard of living; records indicate that their diet improved, as did the quality of their possessions, for example the replacement of earthenware cooking vessels by metallic ones.[29]
However, the increase in wages and improvement in living conditions for workers, as well as attempts by the nobility to mitigate these, provided a new cause for tension between workers and the nobility. Horrox suggests that the relationship between landlords and tenants became increasingly confrontational in the second half of the fourteenth century.[30] In addition, she argues that many contemporary writers began to complain about the decline of visible marks of social distinction and to condemn workers for the ‘frivolous leisure pursuits’ that were indulged in as wages increased.[31] Hollister suggests that the growing sense of grievance at upwards mobility and at this mobility being resisted may have been the cause of popular uprisings, in the latter part of the fourteenth century, in France (1358), England (1381) and also in Spain, the Netherlands and the Holy Roman Empire.[32] Ziegler contends that many factors contributed towards these and that the Black Death cannot be attributed as a direct cause, however, he does suggest that the Black Death contributed towards a feeling of discontent and a desire for change.[33]
Ziegler suggests that the Black Death creating a growing social self-awareness was part of a wider changing attitude towards death.[34] A preoccupation with death wasn’t new to European society however the magnitude of the Black Death forcibly drew society’s attention to death as inexorable, as indifferent to status and as violently affecting the human body; this caused death to be re-evaluated. Death had been part of medieval artwork prior to the Black Death but afterwards there was an increasing emphasis on death as ‘the great equalizer’.[35] The plague had visibly demonstrated that death came for peasants, clergy and royalty alike. David Herlihy and Horrox also argue in favour of a distinct change, displayed in writings and artwork, following the Black Death. They suggest that death is no longer portrayed as being welcomed but as a commanding monster that ignores any desire to live and that increasingly life is portrayed as fragile and death as unpredictable.[36] The fragility of both the human body and the ability to show it reverence after death were emphasised by the numbers of rotting corpses and the necessity of mass graves and banned funeral rites during plague outbreaks.[37] This resulted in the formation of funeral fraternities and Horrox argues that it also contributed to the rise of transi tombs in the late fourteenth century.[38]
The Black Death not only changed attitudes towards death but also significantly altered attitudes towards the human body as it became increasingly important to understand it and the workings of disease. After 1348 there was a fundamental break in intellectual tradition as the authority of Aristotle declined and was replaced by Galen and as medicine turned from God to science for explanations.[39] The plague broke down the divisions between theorizing physicians and practicing surgeons.[40] Theoretical texts were replaced by writings focussed on practical advice and procedures based on actual experience.[41] The study of anatomy, previously banned by the Church, began to be urgently pursued.[42] Rather than attributing disease to God or astrology medical writers began to consider, as contributing factors, famine, overcrowding, lack of hygiene and unburied corpses and they supported the creation of health boards, quarantines and new sanitary regulations.[43]
Changes in medical attitudes reflected a wider disillusionment in the Church.[44] There appears to have been resentment that a catastrophe presented as divine punishment had not been preceded by warnings from the pulpit and in addition the Black Death was accompanied by both lay and ecclesiastical criticism of clergy abandoning their flock or reluctantly performing partial duties.[45] Disillusionment with the Church was heightened as the need to quickly replace so many dead clergy saw ordination requirements being ignored.[46] Knighton and Archbishop Islip were among chroniclers complaining about existing priests haggling for extra pay and new priests including the middle-aged and illiterate.[47] However, Sean Martin emphasises that disillusionment in the Church did not mean that society turned away from faith in God.[48] He argues that rather it created a greater willingness to listen to alternative preachers such as mendicants, Lollards and Wycliffites.[49] As the Black Death continued to recur, and clergy continued to die in large numbers, several additional changes occurred by the end of the fourteenth century. New career opportunities emerged as administrative posts previously restricted to clergy became open to laymen.[50] In addition, these educated laymen, and clergy, were now being taught in vernacular languages due to a lack of teachers left who were fluent in Latin or courtly French; for instance in England, Ireland and the Holy Roman Empire.[51]
The Black Death was a pandemic that caused a catastrophic number of deaths in Europe and took further lives in recurrent outbreaks. It was an event that left almost every remaining person bereaved. It is difficult to examine this period, with the limited records remaining, and have a fully accurate idea of the impact on society of the Black Death. It is likely that some changes it caused directly, such as in medical attitudes, that in other cases it accelerated processes that were already present, such as in land-use, and that we can only speculate about its importance as a factor in others, such as the decline of the manorial system and the peasant uprisings. In considering whether these changes were positive things the question of bias has to be considered. For the peasants that survived there were increased job opportunities, higher wages and an improved living standard by the end of the fourteenth century. However, secular and ecclesiastical landowners were likely to have a different opinion as higher wages, combined with falling prices of agricultural goods,[52] meant decreasing profits. The Church struggled with criticism and disillusionment as it attempted to justify the plague, the actions of its clergy during the plague and what was seen as falling recruitment standards directly after plague outbreaks. On the other hand, to our modern eyes, the Black Death was a positive factor in moving medieval European society closer towards our own; land-use began to move towards a monetary rent system, medicine moved away from faith towards science and anatomical studies, and a change to teaching in vernacular languages would ultimately help aid the development of nationalism. The number of fundamental changes to society that the Black Death caused made it more than a catastrophe; it was a catalyst that altered society from that which came before.
Works Cited
Bolton, Jim, ‘The world upside down. Plague as an agent of economic and social change’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996.
Byrne, Joseph P., The Black Death, Westport, 2004.
Cohn, Samuel K., The Black Death transformed: disease and culture in early Renaissance Europe, London, 2002.
Goldberg, Jeremy, ‘Introduction’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996.
Harper-Bill, Christopher, ‘The English Church and English religion after the Black Death’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996.
Hay, Denys, Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, 2nd ed., New York, 1995.
Herlihy, David, The Black Death and the transformation of the west, Samuel K. Cohn (ed.), Cambridge, Mass., 1997.
Hollister, C. Warren, Medieval Europe: a short history, 6th edn, New York, 1990.
Horrox, Rosemary, The Black Death, Manchester and New York, 1994.
Martin, Sean, The Black Death, Harpenden, 2001.
Nicholas, David, The Transformation of Europe, 1300-1600, London, 1999.
Nohl, Johannes, The Black Death: a chronicle of the plague compiled from contemporary sources, 2nd edn, London, 1961.
Platt, Colin, King Death: The Black Death and its aftermath in later-medieval England, London, 1996.
Ziegler, Philip, The Black Death, 2nd edn, London, 1998.
[1] The focus of this essay is on examining the effects of the plague rather than the disease itself. There is heated debate among historians and epidemiologists as to the nature of the plague, chiefly as to whether it is correct to link it to the bacillus that is responsible for the modern bubonic plague. An excellent treatise on the subject is: Samuel K. Cohn, The Black Death transformed: disease and culture in early Renaissance Europe, London, 2002.
[2] The plague was not restricted to Europe; it also spread throughout Asia, the Mediterranean, Russia, the Baltic and Africa. The scope of this essay however will be restricted to examining the plague’s effects in Europe.
David Herlihy, The Black Death and the transformation of the west, Samuel K. Cohn (ed.), Cambridge, Mass., 1997, pp. 23-25. Cohn, p. 102,
[3] At the time it was referred to as the ‘Big Death’ and this term continued to be used in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries to distinguish this plague from other diseases. Ibid. p. 104.
In the sixteenth century Danish and Swedish chroniclers renamed it the Black Death, meaning terrible/dreadful death, and this is the name that has continued in use to the present day. Herlihy, p. 17.
[4] Cohn, pp. 58-9, 61-2, 83.
[5] Ibid. p. 110; Philip Ziegler, The Black Death, 2nd edn, London, 1998, p. 23.
[6] Cohn, p. 84. Rosemary Horrox, The Black Death, Manchester and New York, 1994, p. 47.
[7] Cohn describes how contemporary chroniclers were shocked that the plague killed regardless of age, sex or social class, p. 100, 126. Horrox, p. 36, 54.
[8] Herlihy, p. 64. Sean Martin, The Black Death, Harpenden, 2001, p. 26, 28.
Johannes Nohl, The Black Death: a chronicle of the plague compiled from contemporary sources, 2nd edn, London, 1961, pp. 12-14.
[9] Nohl, p. 8. Martin, p. 27.
[10] Herlihy, p. 64. Nohl, p. 12.
[11] Herlihy, pp. 60-2. Horrox, pp. 196-8. Nohl, pp. 14-16.
[12] Herlihy, p. 42. Ziegler, p. 127.
[13] Horrox, p. 236.
[14] Ibid. p. 231.
[15] Herlihy, p. 17.
[16] Nohl, p. 7.
[17] These estimates are for the first outbreak of the Black Death, between 1347-1351. Cohn, p. 107. Horrox, p. 3, 231. Ziegler, p. 239.
[18] Significantly, although the first outbreak of the plague had no demographic restrictions, subsequent outbreaks largely targeted children suggesting that the disease had become endemic and that it was possible to build an immune reaction to it within the population. Cohn, p. 131, 212. Horrox, p. 11-12. Colin Platt, King Death: The Black Death and its aftermath in later-medieval England, London, 1996, p. 15.
[19] Joseph P. Byrne, The Black Death, Westport, 2004, p. 116. Denys Hay, Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, 2nd ed., New York, 1995, p. 35. Platt, p. 11.
[20] Jim Bolton, ‘The world upside down. Plague as an agent of economic and social change’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996, p. 18. Byrne, p. 57. Hay, p. 35. Ziegler, p. 247.
[21] C. Warren Hollister, Medieval Europe: a short history, 6th edn, New York, 1990, p. 331. Supported by Martin, p. 47.
[22] Ziegler, pp. 249-252.
[23] David Nicholas, The Transformation of Europe, 1300-1600, London, 1999, pp. 95-6.
[24] Horrox, p. 57.
[25] Legislation of labour occurred in England, Aragon, Castile, Ragusa, many Italian city-states and in parts of the Holy Roman Empire.
Ziegler, p. 246. Nicholas, p. 94. Cohn, p. 127.
[26] Byrne, p. 65.
[27] Christopher Harper-Bill, ‘The English Church and English religion after the Black Death’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996, p. 102.
Horrox, pp. 238-9.
[28] Horrox. p. 240.
[29] Jeremy Goldberg, ‘Introduction’ in Phillip Lindley and Mark Ormrod (eds.), The Black Death in England, Stamford, 1996, p. 8. Martin, p. 80.
[30] Horrox, pp. 239-40.
[31] Ibid. pp. 242-3. Herlihy, p. 48.
[32] Hollister, p. 332.
[33] Ziegler, pp. 258-9.
[34] Ibid. p. 136.
[35] For instance, as in Orcagna’s fresco “Triumph of Death” painted in the church of Santa Croce in Florence immediately after the Black Death. Ibid. p. 284. Horrox, pp. 244-5.
[36] Herlihy, p. 63.
[37] Nohl, p. 20. Cohn, p. 124. Horrox, pp. 244-5.
[38] Horrox, pp. 96, 244-5.
Transi tombs are multi-layered. On the top they show a glorified image of the person while on the bottom is displayed the reality of a worm-ridden corpse.
[39] Aristotle claimed that the heart was the key source of life whereas the Hippocratic-Galenic tradition emphasised the importance of three key sources: the brain, heart and liver. The Black Death, with its three key locations of glandular buboes: groin (linked to liver), armpit (linked to heart) and neck (linked to brain), appeared to prove Galen correct. Cohn, pp. 69-70 and 216.
[40] Herlihy, p. 72.
[41] Cohn, pp. 66-8.
[42] In 1300 Pope Boniface III published a Bull forbidding mutilation of corpses, making the study of anatomy through dissection difficult; Ziegler, p. 71. This altered with the coming of the Black Death as authorities began to actively encourage physicians to perform autopsies; Byrne, p. 114; Herlihy, p. 72.
[43] Cohn, pp. 230-1.
Further information on the formation of health boards and the introduction of sanitary regulations and quarantines can be accessed from the following sources: Byrne, pp. 110-1, 117; Herlihy, p. 63; Horrox, pp. 100, 195-205, Ziegler, pp. 53-4.
[44] Martin, p. 80.
[45] Ziegler, pp. 35-6, 269. Herlihy, p. 64.
[46] Ziegler, p. 270.
[47] Harper-Bill, pp. 90-1. Horrox, p. 241. Martin, p. 80. Ziegler, pp. 270-2.
[48] Martin, loc. cit.; supported by Harper-Bill, p. 89.
[49] Martin, loc. cit.
[50] Harper-Bill, p. 89.
[51] Byrne, p. 69. Martin, p. 80. Ziegler, p. 260.
[52] Bolton, p. 18. Harper-Bill, p. 100-1.
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